Page 169: The most messed up!

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SaintofM
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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by SaintofM »

on the topic of flirting: They may not be like how humans do this, but most animals will try and impress a mate.

Frogs sing.
Birds of Paradise dance.
Elk strut and fight to prove how strong the are.

So while Loroi may not have pickup lines or wear toxic levels of Ax Body Spray they will try to look and act more impressive than the others around them trying to get a male's attention.

As for Historians: if they decide to. Right now they are siding with the Loroi simply because they are their best bet at survival. Neier spac elves nore Historians like eachother very much from the looks of things and are sticking togeather simply out of survival. Alex, and by extention humans may tip the scale here tp one side or the other

Krulle
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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by Krulle »

asaenvolk wrote:Those same Historians have had, what 2? decades now to rearm? This could be bad for the others if they decided to flex.
Luckily they seem to be benevolent watchers.
With a strict non-interference policy.

Using their superior technology to hode away, and secure their borders, and observe.
But it failed once.
We don't know if any mechanism preventing the Umiak from getting their hands on any technology, or reverse-engineerable artifacts, worked.
We don't know if the Umiak gained technology, or knowledge, from the Historians during their stint in the Historian space.
We don't know if the Umiak gained the hiding tech from Farsensing from the Historians (or sufficient knowledge to find the workaround themselves).
The Historians know the Umiak will want more technology from them, if they are able to break in again.
So the next time the Umiak come, they should fing the Historians better prepared. Either in "here they come, get out of their way", or in active pushback military.

Also, last time the Historians did not provide much resistance, IIRC.
They simply moved out of the way, deflecting the Umiak.

Which sounds much like the Historians are not going for any form of hoarding of materials, ships, colonies,.... Their economy seems to be a minimalist economy, to provide necesssities, and sufficient surplus to pursuit the target of archiving history in the local bubble. But not to expand the population, colonies, power, ..., apparently not even to prevent any military incursions from others.

The tech transfer the Historians provided to the Loroi may actually be a counterbalancing tech, to allow the Loroi to counter the Technology the Uniak gained during their military stint in Historian space.
Because having failed to protect knowledge from one side may be seen as "intervening".
So they intervened again to counter the effects a bit.

I wonder if we'll see more "interventions" by the Historians, besides the emissary (Pocket Historian(TM)) telling Alex to shut up.
Vote for Outsider on TWC: Image
charred steppes, borders of territories: page 59,
jump-map of local stars: page 121, larger map in Loroi: page 118,
System view Leido Crossroads: page 123, after the battle page 195

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orion1836
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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by orion1836 »

Arioch wrote: A partial answer is that they see themselves as passive observers of history more than active participants in it. Their "civilization" (if you want to call it that) predates the fall of the Soia, and they've basically been watching the rest of the races recover and rebuild without really helping them or intervening. Kind of like the monasteries in Europe during the Dark Ages, collecting and hoarding knowledge. The Umiak invasion really caught them off guard... despite being much more advanced, they just weren't ready for it... a little bit like those same Christian monasteries that were suddenly being plundered by Viking raiders who weren't Christian and weren't awed by their ancient mystique.
Fascinating - I had never quite pieced that together. I knew they were advanced, but was always under the assumption that they simply had recovered faster after the fall.

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Arioch
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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by Arioch »

orion1836 wrote:Fascinating - I had never quite pieced that together. I knew they were advanced, but was always under the assumption that they simply had recovered faster after the fall.
That's not to say that they weren't affected by the fall, but they didn't suffer a complete breakdown of their civilization or complete loss of technology. They still had to rebuild their infrastructure more or less from scratch, and that did take some time... the Historians not being terribly industrious or handy in the absence of ultra-tech infrastructure.

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orion1836
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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by orion1836 »

Arioch wrote:
orion1836 wrote:Fascinating - I had never quite pieced that together. I knew they were advanced, but was always under the assumption that they simply had recovered faster after the fall.
That's not to say that they weren't affected by the fall, but they didn't suffer a complete breakdown of their civilization or complete loss of technology. They still had to rebuild their infrastructure more or less from scratch, and that did take some time... the Historians not being terribly industrious or handy in the absence of ultra-tech infrastructure.
Do they have a an accurate account of the time before the fall? Do they perhaps know the truth of the Loroi/Barsam/etc's origins?

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Arioch
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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by Arioch »

orion1836 wrote:Do they have a an accurate account of the time before the fall? Do they perhaps know the truth of the Loroi/Barsam/etc's origins?
If they do, they're keeping it to themselves.

Arent
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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by Arent »

Arioch wrote: A partial answer is that they see themselves as passive observers of history more than active participants in it. Their "civilization" (if you want to call it that) predates the fall of the Soia, and they've basically been watching the rest of the races recover and rebuild without really helping them or intervening. Kind of like the monasteries in Europe during the Dark Ages, collecting and hoarding knowledge. The Umiak invasion really caught them off guard... despite being much more advanced, they just weren't ready for it... a little bit like those same Christian monasteries that were suddenly being plundered by Viking raiders who weren't Christian and weren't awed by their ancient mystique.
So, they're a bit like switzerland ;) Since they do apparently infiltrate computers even of the humans, they might have been aware of humanity searching contact to the Loroi, which makes them prime suspects of being the ones responsible of shooting down the Bellarmine.

But since you say now that they are strictly non-interfering, maybe the culprit is someone else.

Btw., are there Darlok in the outsider universe? Just asking, because apart from Mrrshan and Psilon, they were my favorite.

raistlin34
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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by raistlin34 »

Once again, why bother preventing the first contact? Humans are (very) primitive and outnumbered in the conflict. Nothing to gain here.
The only reason I can fathom is that humanity existence could light some...inconsistences in the official narrative regarding Loroi's origins and maybe the Soia themselves.

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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by Arent »

raistlin34 wrote:Once again, why bother preventing the first contact? Humans are (very) primitive and outnumbered in the conflict. Nothing to gain here.
The only reason I can fathom is that humanity existence could light some...inconsistences in the official narrative regarding Loroi's origins and maybe the Soia themselves.
Obviously, humans do have some connection to the Loroi and at least Alex exhibits some special abilities like immunity to their telepathy and also a certain ability to sense at least Fireblade.

& obviously, outsider is about Alex going on a grand quest to save the Loroi & humanity. So, humanity or at least Alex might have some deeper secret to be uncovered.

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SVlad
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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by SVlad »

Arent wrote:Btw., are there Darlok in the outsider universe?
Historians, obviously. They only have ships invisible for loroi OMNISCIENT.
Outsider in Russian
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Arent
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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by Arent »

SVlad wrote:
Arent wrote:Btw., are there Darlok in the outsider universe?
Historians, obviously. They only have ships invisible for loroi OMNISCIENT.
Aren't the historians more reminiscent of psilons? They even have four arms.

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SVlad
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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by SVlad »

In MoO2 Psilon had two arms. And this comics was created long before Wargaming recreated MoO.
Outsider in Russian
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Arent
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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by Arent »

SVlad wrote:In MoO2 Psilon had two arms. And this comics was created long before Wargaming recreated MoO.
(1) The Historians are, to my knowledge, no shapechangers
(2) They have 4 arms, like Psilons in moo1
(3) They are technologically highly advanced, apparently from their own research

If the Historians were the equivalent to the Darlok, they should at least be shapechangers.

Voitan
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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by Voitan »

Arent wrote:
raistlin34 wrote:Once again, why bother preventing the first contact? Humans are (very) primitive and outnumbered in the conflict. Nothing to gain here.
The only reason I can fathom is that humanity existence could light some...inconsistences in the official narrative regarding Loroi's origins and maybe the Soia themselves.
Obviously, humans do have some connection to the Loroi and at least Alex exhibits some special abilities like immunity to their telepathy and also a certain ability to sense at least Fireblade.

& obviously, outsider is about Alex going on a grand quest to save the Loroi & humanity. So, humanity or at least Alex might have some deeper secret to be uncovered.
I think the Loroi telepathy is directly related to humanities "immunity". The assumption that humanity is not telepathic is in my opinion wrong, it's there, just not expressed like a genetic hold over. While connected with Beryl he was able to "see" Fireblade, and the time Fireblade herself tried with much force to get in his head, he was able to "see" her there too. I think the mystery aggressor doesn't want humanity to meet with the Loroi, because there is a possibility that it might create/unlock another species of telepaths. So if Humans had the potential for telepathy, why didn't the Soia just settle with just making Humans full telepaths as their vassals, but instead went with their own creations? Perhaps it was detrimental to their control, or it was flawed, or it was dangerous.

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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by SaintofM »

Voitan wrote:
Arent wrote:
raistlin34 wrote:Once again, why bother preventing the first contact? Humans are (very) primitive and outnumbered in the conflict. Nothing to gain here.
The only reason I can fathom is that humanity existence could light some...inconsistences in the official narrative regarding Loroi's origins and maybe the Soia themselves.
Obviously, humans do have some connection to the Loroi and at least Alex exhibits some special abilities like immunity to their telepathy and also a certain ability to sense at least Fireblade.

& obviously, outsider is about Alex going on a grand quest to save the Loroi & humanity. So, humanity or at least Alex might have some deeper secret to be uncovered.
I think the Loroi telepathy is directly related to humanities "immunity". The assumption that humanity is not telepathic is in my opinion wrong, it's there, just not expressed like a genetic hold over. While connected with Beryl he was able to "see" Fireblade, and the time Fireblade herself tried with much force to get in his head, he was able to "see" her there too. I think the mystery aggressor doesn't want humanity to meet with the Loroi, because there is a possibility that it might create/unlock another species of telepaths. So if Humans had the potential for telepathy, why didn't the Soia just settle with just making Humans full telepaths as their vassals, but instead went with their own creations? Perhaps it was detrimental to their control, or it was flawed, or it was dangerous.

Would humans have had their evolution altered in some way then, say to counter the blue aliens but the fall of the empire and a subsequent dark age hit and the experimenting fell through to allow more natural evolution to take place?

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Ithekro
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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by Ithekro »

Considering how long ago the fall of the Soia was, I don't think they would have been that interested in the proto-Humans of Earth all that much. We are talking around 275,000 years ago for the fall and then before that for any genetic manipulations. While is extremely early Homo Sapiens at best. They might have used these early Humans or one of our cousin Homo genus species as a basis for the Loroi (unless we did have High Elves back then).

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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by Sweforce »

Ithekro wrote:Considering how long ago the fall of the Soia was, I don't think they would have been that interested in the proto-Humans of Earth all that much. We are talking around 275,000 years ago for the fall and then before that for any genetic manipulations. While is extremely early Homo Sapiens at best. They might have used these early Humans or one of our cousin Homo genus species as a basis for the Loroi (unless we did have High Elves back then).
275000 years ago humans was evolved well enough that you could take some, put modern clothes on them and they would not stick out on a busy street of today. This is also true for the neanderthal.

novius
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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by novius »

Templating vs. modification:

Sometimes it is easier to build something from scratch using a given model as a template and adding/removing features as you see fit. The Soia have had the Soia-Liron biology as a building block that has already been tried and true - assuming that the Loroi weren't the first species they created. So why experimenting with something new and unknown if there's a big chance that it would end in failure?

Historians vs. Loroi

The Historians are not quite the stalwart allies the Loroi could wish for - more like allies of convenience or even worse than that. Remember, they usually took a hands-off approach on the local group's affairs, well, until the Umiak decided to make the Historians their business and the Historians taking offense to this. They may have observed the whole thing - how and why the Loroi species was created, the downfall of the Soia and the aftermath. There's no telling on what knowledge the Historians has hoarded, but I get the impression that they have a vested interest in seeing to that the Loroi and Humans never meet. Likely because there is some shared history between Loroi and Humans, one that is better left undiscovered.

Maybe, just maybe it turns out that the Soia were an earlier offshoot of the human's ancestors - after all, even if you go back one million years, well before the founding of the Soia Empire - it is not that much on an evolutionary timescale. And the Loroi were designed as a slave species (what kind of slaves, it could be any guess) and it was a slave revolt that caused the downfall of the Empire.

Maybe it was the Historians - them or them as a part of one of the precursor empires - that tinkered with some proto-human's genome and created the Ubermensch, seeing their mistake much too late, and the newly created Soia went and conquered the local group.

Yep, given that I could totally see why the Historians would rather have that Loroi and Humans never, ever meet or compare notes...

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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by volrath77 »

novius wrote:The Historians are not quite the stalwart allies the Loroi could wish for - more like allies of convenience or even worse than that.
Probably the latter given the Loroi's paranoia of allowing the Historians into their systems. Of course, it's possible that there are all sorts of skeletons in the closet that the Loroi wants to hide from the Historians but it's also possible they probably suspect the Historians as the one 'ally' most likely to stab them in the back. Probably already did but only circumstantial at best and they still lack the definitive proof for it.

Arent
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Re: Page 169: The most messed up!

Post by Arent »

Voitan wrote:
Arent wrote:
raistlin34 wrote:Once again, why bother preventing the first contact? Humans are (very) primitive and outnumbered in the conflict. Nothing to gain here.
The only reason I can fathom is that humanity existence could light some...inconsistences in the official narrative regarding Loroi's origins and maybe the Soia themselves.
Obviously, humans do have some connection to the Loroi and at least Alex exhibits some special abilities like immunity to their telepathy and also a certain ability to sense at least Fireblade.

& obviously, outsider is about Alex going on a grand quest to save the Loroi & humanity. So, humanity or at least Alex might have some deeper secret to be uncovered.
I think the Loroi telepathy is directly related to humanities "immunity". The assumption that humanity is not telepathic is in my opinion wrong, it's there, just not expressed like a genetic hold over. While connected with Beryl he was able to "see" Fireblade, and the time Fireblade herself tried with much force to get in his head, he was able to "see" her there too. I think the mystery aggressor doesn't want humanity to meet with the Loroi, because there is a possibility that it might create/unlock another species of telepaths. So if Humans had the potential for telepathy, why didn't the Soia just settle with just making Humans full telepaths as their vassals, but instead went with their own creations? Perhaps it was detrimental to their control, or it was flawed, or it was dangerous.
I do dimly remember that Arioch implied somewhere that Alex might be a rather powerful "telepath/psionic/whatever". I also havn't yet seen any GURPS sheet of him, which is suspicious.

But maybe I also simply misinterpreted his comment.

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